President’s Letter

Alumni and Friends,

Founded during Reconstruction as a remedy for racial inequity in higher education in Maryland, Morgan State University (MSU) has been tempered by more than 153 years of continual opposition and has emerged stronger than ever. As this magazine documents, Morgan has built an unstoppable forward momentum in its mission during the past decade and was well-prepared to meet the unprecedented confluence of public health, political and socioeconomic crises our nation and the world are now facing. During my 10 years as president of this great institution, I am honored to have been entrusted with the responsibility to protect and expand the legacy passed on by previous Morgan leaders within the Office of the President and elsewhere.

Evidence of our bright future, perhaps best symbolized by our striking new student services and administrative support facility, Tyler Hall, is also within these pages. Generations of our alumni — exemplars of excellence such as Congressman and MSU Board of Regents Chair Kweisi Mfume, national transportation and urban planning expert Stephanie Nellons-Paige and the entrepreneurs leading the Manhattan-based finance firm Momentum Advisors — continue to lead the world, following in the footsteps of brave pioneers such as golf champion Audrey Hill of Morgan’s Class of 1969, whose story of athletic triumph during the civil rights era is told here.

Our students — such as voter engagement activists Kayla Jackson and Jada Grant, and MSU Regent Stanley
Nwakamma — continue to prove that Morgan is growing the future. Our faculty members — passionate
educators and researchers such as our new engineering dean, Oscar Barton, Ph.D., and religion and philosophy professor Harold Morales, Ph.D. — continue to serve as vital instruments to achieve that growth and advance Morgan’s work as Maryland’s Preeminent Public Urban Research University.

As our nation moves thankfully on from 2020, “a year like no other,” Morgan State University is positioned to fulfill its essential role in the current era of global transformation. I hope this message finds you and your loved ones physically, emotionally and spiritually.

Sincerely,

David Wilson
President